This article deals with the much-debated problem of the meaning and
reference of the metaphor of the fox in line 5. Philological, historical
and literary arguments are marshalled in an attempt to understand the
metaphor and its significance in the fragment/poem as a whole. The
conclusions reached are that the metaphor signifies that the Athenians,
rather than being cunning, have been tricked by a 'fox', and
that this 'fox' is a tyrant, probably Peisistratus.

The problem

Solon, the first poet of Athens of whose poetry we have any
examples, (1) used the medium of poetry to analyse the social, economic
and political problems afflicting Athens, and to explain, defend and
justify his reforms before, during and after his term as archon in 594/3
BCE. In Fr. 11 he tells the Athenians in direct terms that their present
suffering is their own fault and not to be blamed on the gods. The
citizens themselves have created the environment for the rise to power
of certain persons and have thus caused their own political enslavement.
The poet then uses a metaphor of people following in a fox's
footprints, refers to the community's stupidity and criticises his
audience for being beguiled by the words of a particular person. The
interpretation of the fox-metaphor has caused some difference of
opinion, and it is on this problem that the present article
concentrates. The text reads as follows:

ei de peponqate lugra di umeterhn kakothta,
mh qeoisin toutwn moiran epamferete:
autoi gar toutou~ huxhvsate rumata donte~,
kai dia tauta kakhn escete doulosunhn.
umewn d ei~ men ekasto~ alwpeko~ icnesi bainei, 5
sumpasin d umin cauno~ enesti noo~:
e~ gar glwssan orate kai ei~ eph aimulou andro~,
ei~ ergon d ouden gignomenon blepete.
3 Plut. Diod.: rusia Diog. Laert.
If you have suffered misery through your wrong-doing,
do not apportion blame for this to the gods;
for you yourselves strengthened these men, giving guards,
and because of this you have evil slavery.
Every one of you walks in the steps of a fox, 5 5
and the mind of all of you is puffed up;
for you give heed to the tongue and words of a sly man,
but of what he does you see nothing.

In spite of differences of interpretation, scholars recognise the
complexity, aptness and evocative power of the image in lines 5-6. (2)
But the precise meaning and application of the metaphor have long been
the subject of debate.

The philological debate

In the absence of en most scholars have understood icnesi as
dativus instrumenti or modi, translating alwpeko~ icnesi bainei as
'walks with the steps of a fox', that is 'behaves like a
fox'. (3) Thus Linforth translated: 'walks with the tread of a
fox'. (4) Similarly, Edmonds rendered the line: 'Each one of
you walketh with the steps of a fox ...' (5). Dietel also
understood icnesi as modal: 'In fr. 8,5 [Diehl] vergleich S. den
einzelnen Athener wegen seiner Schlauheit mit einem Fuchs', and
'Es heisst wortlich: "Von euch geht jeder Einzelne in den
Spuren des Fuchses"'. (6) Masaracchia also preferred reading
icnesi in the simplest and most common way, as an instrumental dative,
indicating careful and circumspect movement. (7) In this reading, the
poet is seen as distinguishing between the Athenians who as individuals
behave with cunning, but as a community display folly or lack of
thought. Wilamo-witz paraphrased as follows: 'Denn ihr seid trotz
aller Schlauheit der Einzelnen ein Volk von Gimpeln.' (8) More
recently Mulke has argued in favour of this interpretation, mainly
because the carefully formulated and positioned antithesis between umewn
d ei~ men ekasto~ and sumpasin d umin would be meaningless if both
verses meant the same. (9) In this interpre-tation, the fox is a general
analogue for the Athenians' behaviour, with no reference to a
particular person.

The minority view is that icnesi is dativus loci, 'in the
footprints', that is 'following the trail' of a fox. (10)
This view was advanced by Kynaston, Buch-holtz and Peppmuller, and
Bucherer, (11) but rejected by Linforth because it offered 'a
metaphor which does not properly describe the cunning of the
Athenians'--a reading which, of course, understands icnesi as
instrumental or modal dative. (12) To eliminate the perceived antithesis
between the indivi-dual and collective behaviour, Cook tentatively
suggested changing cauno~ ('puffed up', 'empty') to
chno~ ('of a goose'). But in the subsequent discus-sion, Page
argued that there was no antithesis and that the words meant
'follow where the fox leads', as in Babrius' fable 95.
Cook conceded that 'Professor Page is evidently right if the fable
is as old as Solon.' (13) According to this reading, then, alwpeko~
icnesi must be understood in the sense, not of imitating the fox's
cunning, but of being deceived and lured by it into a trap. This view is
supported by the fact that the only other recorded use of bainein with
the dative icnesi, and again without en, is in Strattis, the
fifth-century Attic comic poet: penthkonta podwn icnesi bainete
('go in the tracks of fifty feet'), where the locative use is
beyond question. (14) This reading interprets the 'fox' as
referring to a particular individual.

The historical context

Since antiquity readers have naturally tried to connect words in
the poem to actual historical persons and events. At the root of the
problem is the fact that Solon wrote poetry, not history, and chose
general rather than specific terms the content of which his audience
would have readily understood: lugra, kakothta, toutou~, rumata.

After his term of office, Solon left Athens for an intended absence
of ten years, during which political unrest and anarchy prevailed until
Peisistratus gained control in 561/60. (15) Diodorus Siculus (1st
century BCE), Plutarch (1st century CE) and Diogenes Laertius (3rd
century CE) explain that Fr. 11 was composed when Peisistratus became
tyrant. Solon had apparently returned to Athens as we are told that he
experienced the tyranny for nearly two years or more before his death in
c. 559/8. (16) We cannot, of course, fully recover the original
audience's understanding of the text before us. All we have are the
statements of Diodorus, Plutarch and Diogenes, writing between five and
eight hundred years after Solon. Yet they preserve at least one of the
branches of the ancient reception of this poem. Diodorus prefaces his
quotation of Frr. 9 (12 G-P) and 11 with the statements (9.20.2-3) that
Solon wrote the former to warn the Athenians against the imminent
tyranny and the latter when the tyranny was in place. Further along
(19.1.4) he identifies Peisistratus as the person referred to in Fr.
9.3-4. (17) Plutarch (Sol. 30.3) quotes from Fr. 11, names Peisistratus
and, with Ariston of Ceos (c. 225 BCE) as his source, refers to the
fifty-strong bodyguard offered to Peisistratus. (18) Diogenes (1.50-51)
quotes Frr. 9 and 11, connecting both specifically to Peisistratus. (19)
For these three writers the cunning political player in this poem was
Peisistratus.

Unfortunately, the ancient sources do not specify who 'these
men' (toutou~, 3) were. The majority of scholars follow the ancient
testimony, and suggest various possible identities for the men involved:
Peisistratus and his followers, (20) a group of powerful people, (21)
some ruling group not mentioned in the sources, (22) 'those who
administered and executed the law' of Draco, (23) 'capi del
popolo', (24) or unknown persons outside of and opposed to
Solon's own sympotic audience of hetairoi. (25) Wilamowitz
questioned the identification of Peisistratus as the anhr in question,
on the grounds that toutou~ referred to a group, not an individual. He
excluded the Peisistratids as such a group and instead proposed certain
megaloi andre~ (mentioned in Fr. 9) as the agents of political stasei~,
the nature and details of which could not be determined without more of
the poetry and the lists of officials. (26) This view has recently been
restated, in particular because of the change from the plural toutou~ to
the singular andro~. (27) But there is no real problem in the switch
from plural to singular four lines later. Far from it being 'out of
tune with the historical context as well as the grammatical
syntax', (28) it is stylistically and dramatically valid and
effective, gradually focusing attention from a group of men to one
ring-leader. (29) There is also the matter of oral performance. With
deictic body-language like voice-inflection and finger-waving the poet
could have signalled the transition quite unambiguously. Then, apart
from the actual naming of Peisistratus and Draco, the various proposals
as to the persons involved are not all that different: power-seeking
aristocrats who were embarked on a different course from Solon's
own--in short, the megaloi andre~ of Fr. 9. The crucial point is then
the reliability of Diodorus, Plutarch and Diogenes: if they are correct,
Peisistratus is the only possible candidate to fit the profile of
Solon's fox.

The matter is complicated by another problem facing the reader: the
choice between the reading rumata given by Plutarch and Diodorus, and
rusia preserved from a different tradition by Diogenes. The former,
ruma, is unattested before Solon, appearing after him in Classical
Athenian texts in the literal sense of 'defence' or
'protection' offered by something concrete like an altar or
sanctuary (Aesch. Supp. 85; Eur. Heracl. 260) or tower (Soph. Aj. 159),
or, in an abstract sense, like death (Aesch. Fr. 353); rare in the
plural, it is equivalent to bohqhmata, 'resources',
'auxiliaries'. (30) That Solon is recorded as the first to use
the term need not count against this reading: a number of other words,
metaphors and iuncturae are attested first in Solonian texts. (31)

The reading rusia was defended by Linforth, who argued that the
plural rumata denoted 'means of defense' and was therefore too
vague to mean 'bodyguard'. He preferred rusia meaning
'pledges or hostages', and related the text to the mortgaged
lands which Solon had set free in his seisachtheia. (32) An examination
of rusia indeed reveals that the term is used of a 'pledge' in
the form of property (Hom. Il. 11.674), person (Soph. OC 858; Joseph. BJ
1.14.1) or money (SIG 56.41; Joseph. AJ 16.9.2) held as security; but
also of 'reprisals' exacted in the form of physical
punishment, war or death (Soph. Ph. 959; Polyb. 4.53.2; IG 12[2].15.19),
or the seizure of persons (IG 12[5].653.11). (33) The occurrence of the
word in Homer proves its availability to Solon, and, considered together
with the fact that rumata is attested only after Solon, could shift the
balance in favour of rusia. The case for rusia has recently been
restated by Rihll and Gottesman. (34) The former understands rusia as
'sureties' of land or people (hostages) dealt with in
Draco's legislation. The latter rejects the meaning
'pledges' in favour of various forms of exacted reprisals,
taken by force rather than given, so that donte~ has a bitter tone in
keeping with the rest of the poem. (35) In this reading the bodyguards
disappear to be replaced by some form of reprisals. With the removal of
the bodyguards, Peisistratus is left undefended: (36) the
'fox' must be someone else, some unknown person who instituted
debt-bondage (Linforth), or Draco (Rihll). It is perhaps significant
that, although Diogenes preserves the reading rusia, he still connects
it with Peisistratus.

Linforth's suggestion is possible, if it refers (as he stated)
to events preceding Peisistratus. In that case, however, as Wilamowitz
realised, the event referred to and its perpetrator(s) are unknown to
us. This would reject ancient testimony: Diodorus, Plutarch and Diogenes
all explain that, whereas Fr. 9 predicted a tyranny, Fr. 11 was composed
when Peisistratus had already seized power. Furthermore, the nature of
the economic reforms, including the so-called seisachtheia, and their
connection with Solon are still much debated, and it is by no means
certain that rusia refers to any debt-bondage lifted by the
seisachtheia. (37)

For the meaning 'reprisals' the same argument holds: no
specific reference can be tied to the word; Gottesman's
'recent setback at the hands of an opposed hetaireia' is even
vaguer than 'resources' for bodyguards for which there is at
least testimony. In the case of rusia it is also difficult to make sense
of the resultant translation: 'you yourselves strengthened these
men by giving them reprisals.' The meaning 'auxiliaries'
at least provides a meaning linked with the suggestion of abnormal
power, the central theme of the text.

It seems clear from the above that Fr. 11 fits in with the broader
context of Solon's negative attitude to tyranny expressed in other
poems (Frr. 9, 32, 33, 34), and that a specific tyranny is the focus of
his attention. The only other possible figure, apart from Peisistratus,
to qualify as a 'tyrant' in Attica would be Draco, as argued
by Rihll. (38) However, her well-argued case is weakened by the lack of
any ancient testimony or evidence, as she herself acknowledges. (39)

The literary context

A wider perspective, suggested by Page in his reference to Babrius,
may advance our argument. First we glance at the fox's literary
pedigree. This animal is absent in Homer, but appears in Archilochus in
a number of fragments dealing with the fable of the vixen and the eagle
(Frr. 172-181 W) and a fox and a monkey (Frr. 185-187), in Semonides
where it is one of the animals used to characterise women (Fr. 7.7), and
in several other poets after Solon, where its cunning is proverbial.
(40) It is a leading character in the fables of Aesop. This would
suggest that the background of the use here is the world of fable rather
than epic. The surprising occurrence here in an elegy is an indication
of Solon's wish to address his audience on a more accessible level.
(41)

In Babrius' fable 95 a fox, who attends on an aged and ailing
lion in a cave, cunningly lures an unsuspecting stag into the cave on
the pretext that the stag has been chosen to succeed the lion as king.
But the lion pounces too soon, catching only an ear of his quarry with
his claw. The stag flees, but, commanded by the angry lion, the fox
tracks down the bleeding stag and with great skill manages to persuade
it to return to the cave. This time the lion makes no mistake, and the
fox comments on the stag's folly in being deceived twice. (42) Cook
noted the similarity of Solon's cauno~ and Babrius' ecaunwqh
(95.6-7: th~ d o nou~ ecaunwqh / logoisi poihtoisin, 'and the
stag's heart was puffed up with conceit by the spell of those false
words'). (43) There are other similarities: both writers use nou~
to express the empty headedness or folly of their targets, and both
citizens and stag are deceived by persuasive speech (glwssan ... eph,
Sol.; logoisi poihtoisin, Bab.). The two 'plots' share the
basic theme of thoughtless beings deceived by persuasive words. These
aspects are relevant for the political situation sketched in the poem:
on the one hand there is the fox with its cunning, persistence and
persuasive powers, and its offer of power to the unsuspecting victim; on
the other there is the stag's folly in being conned into the same
trap twice.

One of Aesop's fables (147 Hausrath, 142 Perry) involves a fox
and the footprints of various animals leading one-way into a cave where
again an aged lion lies in wait for unsuspecting prey. It is, of course,
impossible to determine whether Solon borrowed from Aesop, or vice
versa, or both from a common source. (44) My intention is not so much to
establish provenance as to attempt to recreate the linguistic
net-working and fathom the semantic world in which the text operated.
The ultimate origin is surely folklore--fables by their very nature
exist in a communal pool before their recording in written form.

Dietel related the words ei~ ergon d ouden gignomenon blepete and
the contrast between eph and ergon to the lion's deception, and the
special significance of the animal tracks. The fox is too clever to
follow the footprints. (45) Is this the intended meaning: that Athenians
as individuals are, like the fox, cunning enough not to fall for the
deception? But then: the Athenians have already been duped and trapped
into tyranny. Solon's 'plot' is different: there is no
lion at the end of the footprints which are those of the fox alone. (46)
So the fox itself is the deceiving animal, cunningly leading others into
a trap. (47)

We return to the text as it survives and construct a narrative
around it. (48) The 'you' plural (ei ... peponqate, 1; mh ...
epamferete, 2) can refer to fellow-symposiasts or to the Athenians in
general. Even if the original performance took place in the ambience of
a symposium, the most likely setting for an elegiac poem, (49) the poet
clearly intended his message for a wider audience. Ancient testimonia
record that on several occasions Solon went to extraordinary lengths to
get his message across. He addressed his poem on Salamis (Frr. 1-3 W) to
the Athenians in the guise of a herald (auto~ khrux hlqon, Fr. 1), and
claims his spirit moved him to teach the Athenians the city's ills
(tauta didaxai qumo~ Aqhnaiou~ me keleuei, Fr. 4.30). In circumstances
very like those of Fr. 11, we are told by Diogenes Laertius (1.49) that
Solon rushed into the assembly carrying a spear and shield, and warned
the people against Peisistratus; on being pronounced mad by the
pro-Peisistratid gathering, he responded in verses which warned that
time would prove him right: deixei dh; manihn men emhn baio~ crono~
astoi~ (Fr. 10). Though ancient reception may have embellished the poems
with fanciful reconstructions of the original context, (50) the
statements in the fragments clearly involve the Athenians as a whole.

It is therefore unlikely that Solon was rebuking only his own group
of hetairoi for allowing such a process to happen: they would constitute
only a small group within the polis, powerless to stop the slide into
'slavery'. Diodorus, Plutarch and Diogenes all say as much.
The citizen-body are as a whole to blame for their servile situation,
for they themselves handed power to certain men. No exceptions or
exclusions among them--Solon's fellow symposiasts, for example--are
stated or implied. (51) Every single one follows the steps of a fox, and
so they are collectively empty-headed.

With the words aimulou andro~ (7) a definite connection is made
between the cunning of 'a man' (not each Athenian) and the
cunning of 'a fox'. The adjective aimulo~ in fact sustains the
fox-metaphor. (52) Alcaeus also applied the metaphor to someone
(Pittacus?) whom he considered a tyrant. (53) The second dev therefore
indicates a continuation of the previous statement, rather than
introducing a different one. The hexameter and pentameter of the first
couplet (5-6) are therefore not antithetical, but in tandem, with the
pentameter rising to a climax. (54) The second couplet explains the
first (gar): as individuals they walk one-by-one into the trap (as in
the fable of the lion), that is, they each pursue their own interests,
while as a group they lack sense in the cause of the public good.

This reading shifts the comparison with a fox away from 'each
one of you' to someone specific, whose identity would have been
obvious to Solon's original audience: the use of the present
participle gignomenon (8) indicates an event 'real' at the
time of writing. Whoever the 'fox' was, the poet's
thought seems to be that no Athenians have the fox's cunning; all
follow unthinkingly and blindly in the tyrant's steps, that is,
where he leads, listening to his words, but ignoring his actions. The
poet depicts the danger inherent in the mixture, on the one hand, of a
demagogue with the power of rhetorical persuasion and, on the other, the
irrational behaviour of the populace. (55)

Conclusion

This whole construct, as is the fate of all literary
interpretation, is, of course, not provable. Arguments on the
philological problem of the kind of dative in line 5 are evenly
balanced, with the parallel from Strattis perhaps adding extra weight to
the locative use. Identification of the historical persons and events
depends entirely on one's acceptance of the reliability of the
ancient sources. If one rejects the tradition as represented by
Diodorus, Diogenes and Plutarch, one is forced to construct another,
unknown and undocumented socio-political institution or event and
instigator or tyrant--a less defensible position. (56) Finally, the
broader context of the fable provides a related pattern of thought in
the deceptive behaviour of the fox and the gullibility of its victims:
the fox refers to a cunning ruler who has deceived the Athenians. In the
light of the surviving testimony and the arguments above that person was
probably Peisistratus.

West, M.L. 1993. Greek Lyric Poetry. The Poems and Fragments of the
Greek Iambic, Elegiac, and Melic Poets (excluding Pindar and
Bacchylides) down to 450 B.C. Transl. with introd. and notes. Oxford.

William J. Henderson

University of Johannesburg

hendersonwj@iburst.co.za

* A shorter version of this article was read at the 27th Biennial
Conference of the Classical Association of South Africa held at the
University of Cape Town on 2-5 July 2007. I am grateful to the referees
for their comments, criticism and corrections.

(1) Cf. Schmid 1959:1.1.364: 'der Begrunder der attischen
Literatur'; Frankel 1975: 218: 'the first time the voice of
Attica is heard in literature'; Knox 1985:1.146: first and an
'unforgettable personality'.

(9) Mulke 2002:224-25. His observation that icno~ with a verb of
giving means 'to copy someone' or 'take someone as an
example' (as at Pind. P. 10.12-13; Plat. Resp. 553a9-10), i.e. the
Athenians are following the fox's behaviour, is less effective in
the absence here of any verbum dandi. Gentili & Prato 1988:112
record Schneide-win's gloss 'singuli sapitis, cuncti
disipitis.'

(10) Cf. Gerber 1999:127: 'Each one of you follows the
fox's tracks ...' Mitchell 1997: 142 translates 'each one
of you comes with the marks of a fox', but does not explain or
motivate her version.

(16) According to Plut. Sol. 32.3, Phanias of Eresus (4th-3rd cent.
BCE) placed Solon's death in the archonship of Hegestratus, nearly
two years after the beginning of Peisistratus' reign, while
Heracleides of Pontus (4th cent. BCE) stated that Solon survived for a
considerable time into Peisistratus' reign. Rihll 1989:277-78
argues for a different chronology.

(24) Noussia 2001:290-91. She re-affirms the identification, while
conceding that proof is impossible.

(25) Gottesman 2005:414-15.

(26) Wilamowitz 1893:2.312; cf. also Linforth 1971:207.

(27) Gottesman 2005:412

(28) Gottesman 2005:412.

(29) This type of anacolython is described by Schwyzer &
Debrunner 1950:704-05: it occurs in natural speech when psychological
impetus outweighs grammatical consideration in longer sentences as if
the earlier part has been forgotten.

(30) Mulke 2002:222-25 also proposes a metaphorical use,
'defences', which is rejected by Gottesman 2005:412-13.

(35) Gottesman 2005:413. In support he cites Bravo 1980:785-92 on
the practice of reprisals (sulan, suvlh).

(36) Lardinois 2006:29 states that, if rusia is the correct
reading, it would also cast doubt on Solon as the author.

(37) French 1984 has (unconvincingly) linked the process of
land-restitution to the readmission of the Alcmaeonids to Attica; but
see Foxhall 1997. Harris 1997 has argued that the seisachtheia was not a
cancellation of debt, but a gift-system used by 'lords' to
gain and maintain power and influence, a practice exploited by
Peisistratus, and that these 'pledges' are to be connected
with the hektemoroi, a payment of one-sixth for services rendered as
suggested by Thuc. 6.45.5 and Ps.-Aristot. Ath. Pol. 16 (110-11).

(38) Rihll 1989.

(39) Rihll 1989:283.

(40) Alc. Fr. 69.6-7 L-P; Timocr. 729 PMG; Pind. Olym. 11.19; Pyth.
2.77-78; Isth. 3.67; 4.45-47. Cf. Kohler 1967:55 n. 33: for example,
'An old fox does not let itself be caught' (Zenob. Centuria
2); as the 'prime minister' of the lion (Timotheus 13); and
also 'Where the lion's skin does not reach, one must patch it
out with the fox's' (Plut. Vita Lysandri 7.4); Kohler 117 no.
30. Keller 1909:1.88-89 records that the fox was hunted for the damage
it caused rather than for its pelt, and in fable attacks birds, rabbits
and vineyards.

(46) A similar change of animal, this time from lion to wolf,
occurs in Fr. 36, on which see Noussia 2001:362-64; Irwin 2005:245-61.

(47) Noussia 2001:293 has made the further point that the fox is
attested in antiquity as prone to corruption. Cf. Cratinus: umwn ei~ men
ekasto~ alwphx dwrodokeitai ('each one of you singly is a fox in
becoming corrupt by bribery'); Edmonds 1957:1.62 no. 128; Kassel
& Austin 1983:135; or, reading dwrodokei ti (128 Kock: 'in
committing some corruption by bribery'); cf. Gentili & Prato
1988:112. Gottesman 2005:414 cites Xen. Cyn. 5.4 and 6.3 and Sem. 7.11
for the idea that a fox's tracks are inconsistent, confusing and
therefore dangerous; and regards rusia and the fox as two metaphors for
the same idea of loss of direction.

(48) On this process, present in all literary interpretation, see
Irwin 2005:4-5.

(49) See Bowie 1986. Lardinois 2006:17-18 believes that the
majority of the Solonian elegies (excluding Frr. 1-4, 4a and 22a)
'are of a generic nature and could have been composed by almost any
poet in almost any Greek city-state.'

(54) Cf. Denniston 1966:162-65. Gottesman 2005:413 regards an
antithesis between the couplets as incongruous with the poem's tone
of rebuke.

(55) Irwin 2006: esp. 42-44 and 68-72 demonstrates how Solon
actually transgressed the traditional boundaries of elegy, and broke
down the exclusivity of the sympotic audience. Noussia 2006:139 also
stresses the non-exclusive nature of the elegies.

(56) Cf. Harris 1997:107: 'An interpretation that explains
Solon's verses in terms of what his poetry says is certainly
superior to one that forces us to resort to guesswork about economic
conditions in Archaic Attica.'

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